Helicopters SAR and Civil!

 Search and Rescue and Civilian Usage?

Many helicopters most people think are for rich people who want privacy in travel, but they are wrong since many are used to ferry workers to our oil and gas rigs in the north sea and from time to time island communities in Scotland and the Scilley off Cornwall, Rathlin off N-Ireland and many other places to!

Helicopters are now common as air ambulances, saving may lives and transporting sick people over great distance from hospital to hospital apart of traffic and work incidents? 

Small types to large ones are employed in these essential roles in our modern world, getting over mountains and water are some of the key aspects of their roles!

Others are used by the national grid in relations to getting engineers to remote places to repair power lines after storms and bad weather, if not civil disturbances and deliberate acts of vandalism

 Meanwhile many are being replaced in some areas of work by drones, that are cheaper and can go places helicopters cannot, but they will also provide services in cities to move donor/ harvesting materials, blood samples and other, which cuts out getting stuck in traffic?

Other machines provide a taxi services for racing jockeys and moving materials that may be urgent for one reason or another and they also come in varied sizes!

The most common types in the U.K. Are the Airbus H135/145, Bell 207, Leonardo A189, 109, 139 and others in the family, the Airbus H225 is mostly deployed to gas and oil rigs and fitted out for 30-+, while the Sikorsky S-76 is the most popular air taxi and the S-92 for search and rescue?

Age of the Drones!

A valuable tool for many Areas?

We are now living in the menace of cheap drones and professional ones being used in an illicit purpose by both criminals and terrorists! But despite all that is negative about them, there is so much that is good and invaluable!

Mountain rescue, the RNLI and other search and rescue will save their own lives, while saving others! Searching for missing people, animals, livestock and various types of hazardous condition such as bush fires, leaking pipelines will save time to find out the exact problem and get it sorted with limited or specific resources?

Long range reconnaissance and observation will help in flight control and also in police work linking visuals to ground unites and assisting helicopter work to be more specialised. In fact there is an unlimited types of uses in the air, land and over the sea, if not also under the sea, pipes and drains with more mobile drones and other Robotic equipment?

New Technology. Part-One.

Drones to Robotics?

Much of what we are terming new has been around for some time in one form or another, but the applications are perhaps newer rather than new? Drones are improving all the time and plans for deployment in the Mars mission as a helicopter have been suggested, while back on Earth the police and search and rescue are using them with effective search and observation results!

Robotics, as in Androids are also improving but no suggestion as yet for sending into Space has been made? On the industrial front, they will perhaps in years to come have a great advantage with helping older folks and young children and the disabled as in both cases!

There are many military applications for both, at this time many poorer nations will probably opt for drones over that of Robots or Androids for border patrols and police work? Drones are much cheaper to deploy than helicopters, unless a large area needs covering or someone in trouble needs to be rescued?

Land Rover Defender, Returns. Part-One,

The Land Rover 110 Defender.

It was sad to hear that the British were dropping their most sucessful product, but some wise spark is now determined to continue the production of this range of 4x4 vehicles? 

Land Rovers do rule the world in the sense that they can be found in nearly every country and noe on this world, from the Series 1 to the many and various adaptions of the standard 90/110.

Between 1970 and 1990 the series did suffer some serious competition from Mercedes-Benz, but it was able to ovecome those unproductive years. Military and police sales have kept it very popular, with many options for Command, Riot-Control and Light-Armoured Cars.

The Landies are good at hauling and pulling and both in civil and military roles can tow boats to surface to air missile systems, radars and even at one time the Bloodhound Mark-II Surface to Surface missile. The ability to tow artillery and other radio-communications. The supply of spare parts and the size of enthusiates clubs, collecters is extensive world-wide.

Originaly desinged for the British SAS, the vehicle is easy to modify and adapt and in the civil role are already covered is up for a large variety of uses.

The Coast Guards. Part-One.

Multi-Role.

Nearly every nation has a rescue service of one kind or another, from being embedded within their police or military. Some are a separate division dedicated to its own provisions of equipment and personnel.

We have mountain rescue, coastguards, Royal Life boat institutions (R.N.L.I.) and many others. Each one plays a specific role on water, in the air and underground. Some fire service units are equipped in this way. There is close cooperation between all the emergency services, during storms, earthquakes, major incidents-accidents and terrorists attacks.

The sea borne operators in the U.S. double up with their vessels to assist narcotics enforcement, apart from search and rescue. This is becoming more so now across the globe with more navies having to deal with people smuggling and ship hijacking.

Modern Airships. Part-One.

Scientific and Zoological Research.

Modern airships are now coming to their fore in the role of atmospheric research, they are ideal for this role because of their slow speed. They more or less can float along with the clouds or the weather systems, of course not all weather is ideal for them.

Other near future roles may be police observation duties and other line inspection in the oil, gas, electric industries. The Airship would also be great for observing how fish, whales, shark's and dolphins migrate and how herds of animals and birds migrate across the Oceans and the continents?

4X4.

Land Rover.

The four by four off roader vehicle is perhaps one of those mile stones in the invention of human history. A vehicle that is capable of driving over difficult terrain, while also being on a normal tarmac road.

One of the daddies of the 4X4 is the now iconic Land Rover series, from the Mark 1 to the present day Defender. The British Land Rover was based on the chassis of the U.S. Willy's Jeep, which had been around from the 1920's in the United States and nearly never was.

There have since 1948 been many takes on the Land Rover, short wheel base and long and the Australian 110. The Land rover is nearly used by every nation in the world for Police, Internal security, Emergency Services and Military use.

But in the civil role it has been ideally suited for farm work, mountain rescue.

Armoured Cars.

When is a car armoured?

There has always been the concept of an armoured chariot or device to move ones troops in relative safety near to the enemy. With the introduction of the petrol engine, the car or automobile was born. Having such a vehicle to patrol, the car was made heavy by the introduction of armoured plating. Thus the early form of the Armoured car.

Today we have a host of vehicles which have been specifically designed for the military, para-military police, anti-terrorist operations and riot control. Each has a differing measure of hull plating, while armament varies from smoke dispensers to light machine guns up to heavy weapons and rocket launchers of various types.

Some vehicles have become known as the ARV (Armoured reconnaissance vehicle), these have serious fire power 76, 87 or 90mm guns, some such as the Brazilian Engesa EE-9 Cascavel. They also may be armed with SAM (Surface to air missile) systems.

Gyro-Planes. Part-Two.

One of the first gyro-plane designs was the German Focke-Achgelis Fa 330 (water wagtail). It looked more like a helicopter kite, than a gyro. but it did the same job. A modern version of this is the micro-light Brock KB-2 operating in the U.S. for a $1000 dollars. 

The gyro platform is one of the cheapest ways of enjoying both hover and movement in an aircraft. Police and survey work of several kinds can be achieved. But to go beyond, one needs the Beagle-Wallis, which can be armed with a light machine gun and rockets pods.

Motorbikes...

Cycles. 


When we put the engine on the bicycle man invented the motor bike and with it came the horse on two wheels.


This form of transport came into its own right from the day it was conceived, as a messenger service vehicle. But today it is used by courier services, the police and paramedics. 


In the so-called third world the Rickshaw has been motorised to great effect as a little road vehicle. Many businesses have stemmed from this conversion.


There have been additions apart from the trike, there is also the fitted side cars, which I am now told are luxury compared to the old days. 


Sport has seen these machines improve into super everything and why not.


Triumph, Honda, Suzuki, BMW, Harley-Davidson, Kawasaki, Laverda,  Neval, Yamaha, Piaggio, Norton.